By Nnamdi Elekwachi
Attorney General, Abubakar Malami, reminds me daily of his predecessor, Michael Kaase Andoakaa, the one who said late President Yar’Adua could rule Nigeria from anywhere, including from his sickbed and yet was sacked before long after natural event removed Yar’Adua both from his sickbed and seat as the president and enthroned Goodluck Jonathan, but Malami could be worse, even.
You see, nothing convinces this writer (may I assume that noble title here for the purpose of this read) that Malami works for the common good or in the interest of the nation, not even when he, as the Chief Law Officer of the federation, said national interest is his prerogative; his personal call and decision to make, for which he flouted court orders on the Dasuki matter.
And so, when the Southern Governors met and declared a ban on open grazing in the face of wholesale butchery and bloodbath being carried out by armed Fulani herders in other parts of the nation, the ‘Learned Gentleman’ went out of his way comparing herders with automobile spare parts dealers!
But Malami is in the news again today, and for the wrong reasons. Responding to questions after Wednesday’s federal executive council (FEC) meeting, Malami had said the federal government would do everything possible, including imposing of emergency rule, to ensure that election holds come November 6, 2021, in Anambara State.
That reckless remark reminded me of the purported online memo wherein Malami, it was alleged, urged the president to suspend constitutional provision of human rights as enshrined in Chapter Four of the 1999 constitution (as amended) and place Nigeria under martial law so as to acquire more powers to contain insecurity, an allegation the attorney himself later denied through his media aide.
But the irony is that according to the 1999 constitution, emergency rule is no business of Malami’s. Emergency rule comes under the rubric of Miscellaneous Provisions of Chapter VIII in section 305 of the constitution.
Section 305 subsections 1 to 6 i.e Sec 305(1)-(6) under which emergency rule was contemplated in our constitution did not mention the office of the attorney general as the one to decide when or how emergency is to be declared and for whom. What, however, subsection 1 of section 305 under review said is that:
‘…the president may by instrument published in the Official Gazette of the Government of the Federation issue a state of emergency in the federation or any part thereof.’ Subsection 2 (2) of the same section 305 under review makes it clear that pursuant to subsection 1, the president ‘shall immediately after the publications, transmit copies of the Official Gazette…to the president of the Senate and speaker of the House of Representatives each of whom shall forthwith convene or arrange a meeting of the House of which he is president or speaker…’
Here, the president is by our law expected to publish in the Official Gazette of the federal government the instrument of emergency rule and all details pertaining to same. But even the president alone cannot on his own decide that emergency exists in any state within the federation without the governor and House of Assembly of the affected state. Subsection 4 contemplates thus:
‘The Governor of a State may, with sanction of a resolution supported by two-thirds majority of the House of Assembly, request the President to issue a proclamation of emergency in the state…’
Again, subsection 3 highlighted the conditions that may necessitate emergency proclamation in paragraphs (a)-(g) to include but not limited to: when the nation is at war; the federation or a part thereof is under invasion; there is a natural disaster and calamity; breakdown of public safety and peace, and so on.
Subsection 6 of the same Section 305 makes it clear that even the National Assembly may revoke, with two-thirds majority votes, such emergency proclamation as made by the president and that when the National Assembly approves of same, it shall exist for and not exceed a renewable period of six months to allow constitutional order to be restored.
So from the foregoing, emergency rule lies with: The President, National Assembly, Governors and Houses of Assembly and not with the person and office of the attorney general. This shows the overreaching tendencies of a man like Malami himself and how he makes Buhari unpopular continually.
Malami, going by the law, is not the one to tell Nigerians that emergency rule is on the cards since he is not the national security adviser or defence minister; he can only advise on how an emergency rule should be followed constitutionally, but rather than that, the attorney general himself upturned the constitution he was supposed to uphold. So much for an attorney!
Why do I think Malami doesn’t mean well for Anambara and the Southeast?
You see, barring President Goodluck Jonathan, who declared emergency in the Northeastern states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe, all other emergency proclamations in Nigeria had gone beyond and outside the constitutional limit.
The first time emergency was proclaimed in Nigeria was in 1962 during the Action Group crisis that badly rocked the post-independence Western region. In a bid to achieve his parochial goal, Prime Minister Tafawa Balewa of the NPC declared emergency over the West so that his quisling, Samuel L. Akintola, could remain the regional premier there even after his party caucus had sacked him.
The result was ‘Operation Wetie’, ‘Wild Wild West’ and the subsequent anarchy which led to the 1966 coups d’etat and eventual civil war of 1967-70. At the end, the nation bore witness to the fact that the emergency Balewa declared over Yorubaland was ill-considered, not to restore constitutional order, necessarily.
The second emergency in Nigeria was that declared in May, 1967 through which Gowon brought the whole of Nigeria under military jackboot assuming fuller authority as Commander-in-chief so as to prosecute what war and carnage we know as Biafra War. Since in wars rights are not usually guaranteed, genocide, blockade and other unendurable conditions attended that war under emergency rule.
The worst for the politics of emergency rule in Nigeria came during Obasanjo’s administration (1999-2007). Following attacks in a predominantly Christian community, in Plateau State, against Muslims which led to thousands of deaths, Obasanjo removed elected governor, Joshua Dariye, from seat in 2004 and in his place put Chris Alli, a retired army general as ‘sole administrator’.
Obasanjo, in a broadcast, would later boast about how he had acted in line ‘with the constitution.’ But in actual sense, Obasanjo created, or rather, followed a bad precedent set by Balewa in the latter’s May 1962 emergency proclamation over the West wherein his NPC-led federal parliamentary government flouted Privy Council ruling (the Council was then the apex court until Nigeria attained status of a republic on October 1, 1963) favouring Adegbenro over Akintola as premier.
Obasanjo himself didn’t tell Nigerians where he derived the power to sack civil, elected authority putting in its place unelected from. This was outside the constitution but Obasanjo went unchallenged because by that time, he had the kind of Senate he wanted – which is what Buhari has today – after the impeachment of Dr. Chuba Okadigbo.
In 2006, Obasanjo was at it again regarding emergency. This time, it was with Governor Fayose of Ekiti State, and after Obasanjo had him ‘impeached’, he installed one Tunji Olurin, another retired army officer again and would sack the state House of Assembly – impunity!
It was only Jonathan who followed due process without creating a parallel or quasi-subnational government in the name of emergency when he declared same over the three states of Borno Adamawa and Yobe to execute his anti-terror campaign.
My fear is that Malami, given his tendency to give the constitution a parochial interpretation, may be considering sack of constituted authority in Anambara State just as we saw in the Obasanjo days. What he missed was that though it is bad, Anambara State has a charged polity.
The 1983 C.C. Onoh and Jim Nwobodo contest should remind us all a thing about the state where a sitting governor was abducted by powers that be. This is not to support killings and threats to lives happening in Anambara, though, but to deepen the understanding that happenings there, aside from being historically driven could as well be politically motivated and one that could be addressed if all known instrumentalities of peace are to be explored.
The task should be getting the 18 governorship aspirants in Anambara to commit to ensuring peaceful, free and credible election while their supporters sheathe their swords. As for the Biafra separatists, it is time for Buhari to start considering dialogue.
What is more, right to self-determination does not negate that to hold political view and to vote and be voted for in an election, certainly the situation is a worrying trend but not one that requires emergency as first line of action. Malami could well be an attorney or an ambulance chaser, but with him, I differ in this!
I’m off to Timbuktu.
• Elekwachi is a public affairs analyst.